Review: Injustice: Gods Among Us (PS3)

By Wayne Webb

Injustice: Gods Among Us is a fan boys dream come true. It’s partly an engaging story delivered as an interactive movie and partly a brawling fighter game. Injustice excels at both of these aspects, and for a fighting game, rises above all others.

By Wayne Webb

Injustice: Gods Among Us is a fan boys dream come true. It’s partly an engaging story delivered as an interactive movie and partly a brawling fighter game. Injustice excels at both of these aspects, and for a fighting game, rises above all others.

It’s built by the same people that remade Mortal Kombat and it will obviously draw comparisons with that game and other “streetfighter” clones that have been around for decades. Where Injustice rises up is in the ability to play as your favourite DC-based comic world hero or villain and participate in a movie-length story of alternate universes and heroism. The top-notch visual design and animation is the best I have seen in some time and it shines by comparison to most games, let alone most fighter games. Add in the voiceover acting by DC animation stalwarts, plus a large cast of characters, and you have a superior story experience. The transition from story to fight scene where you take the reins, is almost seamless, the first few catching me by surprise.

Fighting mode is familiar territory, and while each fan has their favourite game this one delivers all the things you want and need in a brawler. The environments are destructible and can be used to your advantage. The combos you can learn are long and complex, but there are plenty of decently powerful moves that you can button-mash if that’s your style. Signature moves for each fighter add even more DC-styled animation and fan-boy dreams as they encapsulate the being of the hero or villain you have chosen. My one niggle is that the directional controls would occasionally misread and therefore even fulfilling parts of the tutorial in sequence became frustrating, but you can skip individual tasks.

The fighting in the storyline follows a preset path with brutal bouts being your stepping stone to eventually completing the 13 or so “levels” with four fights per level. Once that is over, there is one-on-one local fighting, skills labs, multiplayer online or split-screen, challenges and unlocks galore. For the completeist amongst you there is plenty to come back for, loads of challenges to play against like perhaps winning a bout with Shazam and avoiding lightning strikes. There are hundreds of these types of goals in there.

One of the most enjoyable and entertaining fighter games I have played for years, but ultimately once you have finished the story it is at its heart a fighter game. You need someone to fight (or go online) to really enjoy the most of this game.

Pros: Great acting, brutal fighting, loads to unlock, DC characters, interactive movie, interactive environments
Cons: Occasional detection issues.

4.5 Shacks Out Of 5